Operation: Hollow Storm
'Operation: Hollow Storm'Gears of War 2 was a two day longGears of War 2 Collectible massive military counterattack, which had directly aimed to kill the remaining Locust that survived the Lightmass Offensive. It would be a Pyrrhic victory for the COG, though with thousands of Gears killed, captured or missing in the attack on the Hollows, and an unknown amount of vehicles and equipment lost during the trek to Landown City. However, the most devastating loss was the last COG stronghold Jacinto City, which was sunk in a last ditch attempt to destroy the Locust by flooding the Hollows. The events of the operation led to the discovery of the Locust Civil War and the destruction of Nexus. The flooding killed an untold amount of Locust soldiers and creatures, but some escaped. Order of Battle COG Preparations In order for the Coalition to strike back at the Locust Horde it had to organize an army with very little time and barely any spare equipment. The COG managed to muster up hundreds of Assault Derricks, Centaur Tanks, cargo trucks, Armadillos, and King Ravens, while at the same time fighting off the Locust in the streets of Jacinto City itself. With time running out and Jacinto City threatened by the Riftworm, the COG had to send all able bodied men ranging from Stranded conscripts, fresh recruits, battle hardened Pendulum Wars veterans, pardoned ex-convicts from the "Slab" and Gears infected with the Rust Lung disease. Assault on Landown After fighting off another Locust raid into deep sectors of Jacinto, Chairman Richard Prescott gave one last motivational speech before he sent out the Coalitions finest (and only) soldiers on either a suicidal run or the greatest achievement in Seran history. After the COG troops met at the staging area they moved out to assault the city of Landown, where the ground could be penetrated with Grindlift platforms and from which an attack on the Locust home front could commence. The main convoy began their attack on Landown while other Gears (Echo-9) met no resistance. After encountering heavy resistance and taking numerous casualties from Locust air and ground forces and passing sinkholes the columns were able to reach Landown and succeeded in briefly taking the city. After a short but heavy fight Landown was liberated. The Rigs in the city and outside were able to line up and begin the countdown to send the Grindlifts.Gears of War 2 Shortly after, the Locust high priest Skorge led a counter-attack against the Coalition forces within the city. Luckily, Coalition troops were able to deploy the Grindlifts and thus able to begin Operation: Hollow Storm.Gears of War 2 act 2 The Inner Hollows After digging their way through, the Gears found themselves unable to communicate with High Command on the surface. While Delta squad was regrouping and dodging Grindlifts digging past them, several other squads including Alpha-7, Echo-5, Alpha-1,and Sigma-One were moving into the hollows and engaging heavy resistance. Alpha-1 was able to proceed and destroy the Seeders while other Gears hit Locust hard points. After briefly reestablishing a communications link with the surface, the Gears began to advance deeper into the Hollows. Echo-Nine landed inside the Hollows but did not meet any enemy forces for thirty minutes, then were ambushed and engaged in an hours long firefight ending with all of them either killed or captured. Delta Squad, one of the few squads making progress, was able to destroy a Locust staging ground. They located a Locust forward base, eliminated all Locust forces in the base, eliminated a Locust patrol, and were able to save many Gears in the process. This advance was ended when the entire city of Ilima was brought down by the Locust Riftworm. The Riftworm was killed by Delta Squad, who severed its arteries from the inside. While High Command sent squads to secure the Ilima sinkhole, Delta was reassigned on a recon mission. After one day of fighting inside the Hollows, hundreds of Gears were captured by the Locust and many were either "processed" or executed.Gears of War: The Quickening The Second Wave and the Locust Civil War After Delta Squad members Dominic Santiago and Marcus Fenix located the Locust home city of the Nexus, they used JACK to send out a homing beacon. This allowed COG reinforcements to safely dig into the city and avoid the Imulsion lakes. During the second assault on the Hollows the Coalition discovered that the Locust were in the midst of a civil war with their subspecies, the Lambent, who appeared to be winning. Coalition troops located slave quarters of captured Gears and Stranded, kept in incarceration by the Locust for unknown reasons. Delta Squad located the Locust Queen Myrrah, but she escaped on a Reaver while leaving her general Skorge to deal with them. Dom and Marcus drove him off and after chasing Delta Squad on his Hydra, the Hydra is destroyed and Skorge killed. After Locust forces began a massive assault on Jacinto and the Coalition in turn began the opening phase of the plan to sink the city itself, all remaining Gears in the Hollows pulled out.Gears of War 2 act 4 Flooding the Hollow Coming up with a plan to flood the Hollow and hopefully drown the Locust in their tunnels based on a message from Adam Fenix found in Nexus, Sergeant Marcus Fenix and Private Dominic Santiago were sent back into the Hollow underneath Jacinto City to clear an opening for a King Raven to drop a Lightmass Bomb into the cavern and sink Jacinto. Marcus and Dom punched a hole through the city and into the massive sinkhole the Locust forces were coming from. Killing a Brumak pilot, the two hijacked the Brumak and used it to punch through hundreds of Locust forces in the Hollow into a massive cavern beneath Jacinto City that was perfect to drop the bomb. Using the Brumak's weapons, Marcus and Dom destroy three columns and open a hole in the roof, allowing in three King Ravens. However, the Brumak mutates from massive exposure to Imulsion in the cavern and becomes a Lambent Brumak. While Marcus and Dom are extracted from the Brumak's back as it begins to mutate, the Brumak knocks the Raven with the Lightmass Bomb into the Imulsion, destroying the COG's method of sinking Jacinto. Realizing that the Lambent Brumak is powerful enough to act as the needed explosion if killed, Marcus drops the Hammer of Dawn on the Lambent Brumak, killing it. As the Lambent Brumak explodes, the surviving Ravens flee the cavern. The Lambent Brumak explodes, taking out the remaining support structures of Jacinto, causing the plateau to sink, allowing sea water to flood the Hollows, drowning most of the Locust Horde and the advancing Lambent army. Aftermath The COG was able to evacuate 70% of the remaining civilians and Gears from Jacinto and Inner Hollows and moved to Port Farrall, an abandoned northern city. After this was found to be too inhospitable for the survivors of Jacinto, the camp was moved to the island of Vectes. The Operation failed to eliminate Lambent and Locust forces completely, although most of the Locust were killed. The surviving Locust were forced to live on the surface and most became the Savage Locust without the leadership of their Queen, though some continued following Myrrah as the Queen's Guard.Gears of War 3 An unfortunate side-effect of the flooding was Imulsion was pushed into the sea and the soil by the water and accelerated the Lambent Pandemic. However, the drowning of most of the Horde and their splitting into two factions allowed the COG time to recover before the Lambent arrived. With millions of Locust dead, it also severely weakened the remaining Locust's ability to continue the war. References Category:Battles Category:Events Category:COG military victories